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Support Independent Scholarly Communication Infrastructure This Giving Tuesday

Want the TL;DR? We’re seeking donations to support our Mastodon server! If you believe this is a worthwhile cause and are in a position to help, we would be hugely grateful for your donation.

Academic communities need infrastructure, just as our local communities do. And infrastructure requires investment, which is why this Giving Tuesday we’re asking for your support for a new piece of infrastructure we have recently launched: hcommons.social, our Mastodon server.

Mastodon is an open source, decentralized social network developed by a non-profit that is gaining steam as an alternative to the increasingly unstable Twitter. For better or worse, Twitter has become an established part of the academic infrastructure, and while its issues have never been invisible, especially to those who are most harmed by them, recent events have pushed many to find a new space for their academic and social networks to live and grow.

We’ve long been in the infrastructure game, and see this new commitment as important to our work to ensure there are viable options for researchers, students and educators looking for an alternative to for-profit, extractive social media platforms.

Our experience also means we know that maintaining infrastructure is like the duck feet paddling hard under the surface of the water.

Recently, our Mastodon duck hasn’t been so subtle in its paddling as we find and fix the many kinks that have come with launching and seeing it grow so quickly. We’re thrilled that there has been such great uptake, and want to be sure we can continue to support this growth.

Clearly, though, with that commitment comes costs. And this Giving Tuesday, we’re asking for your help so we can continue to invest time and resources in growing hcommons.social.

Right now, our major costs are hosting and maintenance. The former we are currently covering with DigitalOcean credit and the latter is currently covered by volunteer labour. As a rule, we dislike not paying people for their time, so this is a big piece where we hope you as a community can support us to engage someone (or several someones) more regularly and adequately compensate them for their work. Right now, hosting is estimated at $150 per month and we’ve estimated support and maintenance at an additional $150 per month.

In addition, we are planning to establish a moderator community who can take on duties like responding to reported behaviour, approving new accounts and monitoring for spam. Once again, our goal is to be able to offer these moderators a small honorarium for their contributions. We’ve estimated this cost at $200 a month to start.

With these in mind, our goal for this Giving Tuesday campaign is to fund 6 months of hosting, maintenance and moderation for a total of $3000. Can we do it? There’s only one way to find out!!

If you’re as invested as we are in a future where communities build the product, instead of being the product, and in a position to contribute, we would be hugely grateful for your donation. And if you want to know anything more before making a commitment, please reach out to @hello@hcommons.social on Mastodon, or hello@hcommon.org (good old fashioned email).

Thank you for all your support,

The HCommons Team

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Humanities Commons Launches Mastodon Server Open to Scholars

Anyone using or observing Twitter will be well aware of the recent purchase of the company, which throws the future of the platform into, at best, uncertainty, and at worst, turmoil.

In response, many scholars have been considering a move to Mastodon, a non-profit, federated alternative social network. Being federated, Mastodon requires access to a server (here’s more on how Mastodon works), which is where we come in.

In response to community requests and our own recognition of the potential in this moment, we are launching hcommons.social, a Mastodon server open to all scholars (which we take to include: researchers, librarians, instructors, students, staff and anyone else with an active interest in research and education.) While we expect this space to lean Humanities-heavy, we leave it up to users whether it feels like the place they want to be. To start, there will be no limit on sign-ups, though we will review that policy over time as we learn more about the costs and overhead of managing the server.

We’ve moved quickly to get this up and running, and are doing so in the spirit of experimentation. We’ve never done this before. Many of the people who use it will probably not have either. So we’re going to have to figure things out together!

To start, we are putting in place:

  1. Server rules that prioritize harm reduction and will be enforced via…
  2. A clear moderation policy,

And if you’re new to Mastodon, a wonderful HC user has created an excellent guide to getting started.

As the server grows (or doesn’t), we will be reassessing what is needed and will want to hear what you need to get the most from the space. There are lots of outstanding questions around costs, level of interest, support needs and our capacity, but we’re of the opinion that we can best answer those by diving in with you all! We’re also lucky to be launching in a moment where more how-tos are being created than ever before, so we encourage you to draw on those as our expertise and support capacity are still developing.

In that spirit, and to help make this undertaking a little more sustainable for our team, we’re inviting anyone who might be interested in becoming a moderator to register their interest. It is early days figuring out what this looks like and what the needs are, but if you throw your hat in the ring we will reach out when we know more.

More than anything, we are excited to see what you all will do with this opportunity.

As a team, we are deeply invested in creating spaces where community interactions are the focus, not just a front for selling advertising, mining data and extracting value. Whatever anyone’s predictions, the acquisition of Twitter by a billionaire technocrat is just another chapter in a long history of platform commercialization and enclosure, which is inextricable from the trend of increasing harm to minoritised users and communities, predominantly Black, Brown, Disabled, Queer, and Trans people.

This history is not so different from the legacy of publisher gatekeeping, platform monopolisation and data extraction that we at Humanities Commons are combating through the provision of open, values-driven, academy-owned infrastructure for digital scholarly work. 

In other words, we are always on the lookout for opportunities to create spaces of radical possibility. We hope you all have fun exploring this one.

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Open Access for Teachers: A Reflection from a New Hire

Last week, we celebrated International Open Access Week with guest posts from some of our friends, and we decided to keep the party going a little longer! Today, June Oh, Assistant Professor in English & Digital Studies at The University of Texas at Tyler, shares her thoughts on the joy of an open access syllabus.

Recently, I realized something about open access. It’s not just about those publications I want to get; it’s about the support for the teachers. Previously, I shared my experience as an international student finding joy in open access (“Humanities Commons for International Students and Scholars”). Now adopting from an R1 university to an R2 mentality, and with a few access issues every now and then, what I experience daily isn’t just about research. It’s about teaching—and how open access is a shining light for a busy, worried, and eager instructor.

I’m a new hire with three new class preps and upcoming class pilot proposals for a new minor, a new certificate, and a new PhD program on my radar. As I was entering the job market as an English literature major—18C literature—I learned pretty quickly that all academic jobs, at least for the first several years, will ask me to teach outside my comfort zones and expertise. It does. And I need help.

From class activities and rubrics to syllabus and learning objectives, open access teaching materials available on Humanities Commons soothe my new hire anxiety. Googling works too, but sometimes the promising-looking syllabus sits behind the veil of the university proxy. Other times, I venture into platforms like “Teachers Pay Teachers” but rarely find higher ed materials. As of October 20, Humanities Commons hosts 402 items that are categorized as syllabus. Just looking at the topics and the titles of these courses inspire me. Also, what I love about Humanities Commons’ open access is that it opens space for what I consider teaching-in-progress. I search for “Digital Humanities syllabus,” and I see Kristen Mapes’ syllabi from 2017, 2018, and 2021, among others. What I see in these syllabi are Kristen’s continuing revisions and experiments with her pedagogy, materials, and approach. I know in theory no class is perfect and it’s a work in progress. But the academic plague of perfectionism gets in the way. That’s when actually having access to and reading the syllabi from other instructors through open access platforms is saving my day.

It’s starting to get chilly and the university bookstore is asking for a book request. And tonight, I’ll make some tea and find joy in open-access syllabi.

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Finding Joy in Open Access: Reflections from the Humanities Commons Team

As we conclude our celebration of International Open Access Week, we asked our team to reflect on what joy in open access looks like for them.

Zoe Wake Hyde, Community Development Manager

As someone who has worked for many years in open access and open education, I have a somewhat complicated relationship to the theme we chose for this year’s OA Week. I have found genuine joy in doing work that I care deeply about, particularly in the relationships I have forged and the sense of belonging that the open community can inspire. But I’ve also experienced some pretty profound despair when things have gotten hard, progress has stalled, outside influences interfere (hello, pandemic) and our efforts have been co-opted by those who created the problems we’re trying to address in the first place. 

Joy is personal. Open work feels personal. It’s natural and, frankly, wonderful to find joy in this kind of work, but there is also always the risk of hurt that comes along with it. I don’t have any tidy solutions here, but there is a balance I am learning to manage between investing myself in my work and keeping enough distance that I can manage the tough times. I also think we should strive to learn from the incredible social justice movements that have come before us; nothing is ever entirely new and we would be wise to remember that we are far from the first to consider the personal costs of doing purpose-driven work.

What I am sure of is that whatever the risks of embracing joy, my work and my life are better for it. 

I can never resist a good book recommendation, so here goes: Joyful Militancy – Building Thriving Resistance in Toxic Times 

I also found this in the wilds of Twitter recently and felt it spoke to what I’ve written about here:

Bonnie Russell, Project Manager

As a librarian, I think a lot about how to ensure access to information of all kinds. Prior to joining the Humanities Commons team I spent almost 10 years in scholarly publishing, and I grew increasingly concerned about the sustainability of current publishing models. There is a growing barrier to access for many who are not affiliated with institutions or who are at institutions that simply can’t afford the increasing subscriptions in the current market. 

For me, the joy in OA is bringing information to everyone, regardless of position and financial means. OA allows everyone equal access to information, and at the same time it empowers everyone to disseminate their work widely. OA levels the playing field. It connects global collaborators, and it allows those who want to research and create to build on the work that has come before. 

Scholarship is becoming increasingly multimodal. Undergraduate students in the humanities are taught not just writing, but often work with audio, video, and video games. As these formats continue to grow journals and monographs won’t disappear, but they will come under increasing competition for views. OA offers these students and scholars the ability to share their work widely when many publishers simply can’t find a way to publish these new formats. My joy at this moment is being a part of the Commons and working to think about not just what’s happening now, but how we can support these new formats in the future.

Larissa Babak, User Engagement Specialist

When I think about finding joy in open access, my memory points me back to a collection of “aha!” moments.  

As part of my experience as an instructional designer, I’ve had numerous opportunities to talk to faculty about open educational resources. There are so many incredible OERs available, but often, faculty are not sure where to start when looking for an OER. Joy arrives in the “aha!” moments when a faculty member who is passionate about all the benefits of open access finds the right text for their course. 

As part of the Commons team, I constantly have my own, joy-filled “aha!” moments, too. Regularly, I’ll browse the CORE repository and spot a deposit with a fascinating title, or a colleague will share a deposit I might find of interest. In the user support I provide on the Commons, I’ve had the privilege to meet numerous journal editors who are moving their journals to the Commons in order to ensure their work is available to all. Each of these meetings are inspiring to me in the enthusiasm, dedication, and commitment brought to the cause of open access. 

In these ways, joy feels like the proverbial lightbulb going on inside my brain. Joy can be found in my personal moments of finding open access texts that inspire me, but also in the ability of open access to bring people together.

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A Bumpy Start to the Joys of Open Access: A Festive Perspective

Today, as we continue to celebrate International Open Access Week and reflect on finding joy in OA work, we’ve got a guest post from our friends at H-Net and the Journal of Festive Studies.

More than six years ago, the open access joy of The Journal of Festive Studies began. Patrick Cox, the then-Vice-President for Networks at H-Net: Humanities and Social Sciences Online reached out to Ellen Litwicki and Aurélie Godet – both scholars of festive studies – to ask them to act as lead-editors for this new open access publication. H-Net had been established nearly 25 years before and had since blossomed into a well-established platform where scholars shared resources and ideas and published tens of thousands of freely available book reviews, making it well situated to publish an open access journal.

At the same time Patrick  reached out to Ellen and Aurélie, he also initiated the process of starting a new H-Net network, H-Celebration, to host the journal. Patrick also recruited me as managing editor and Réa de Matas, who currently is a member of H-Net’s Council, to become an editor for H-Celebration and develop the graphics and logos for the journal. In the background, Yelena Kalinsky, H-Net’s Associate Director of Research and Publications at the time, already worked their magic, supporting us as production manager—and with everything else. Basia Nowak and Charlotte Weber, the copyeditors for H-Net Reviews, soon joined the team with their copyediting expertise.

Back then, we received journal submissions via email, which we then had to upload and organize on a private H-Net network on the H-Net Commons. While this system worked well enough in the beginning, it quickly became confusing as we separated submissions, author bios, and peer reviews to ensure the double-blind peer review process. Luckily, Yelena was already working on another solution: using the Open Journal Systems.

Since the inaugural issue, a lot has changed. We now use Open Journal Systems – a management software for open access academic journals—a huge relief! A few months ago, Emily Joan Elliott took over for Yelena. After issue 4, Ellen will leave us and Isabel Machado, our guest editor for issue 3, has already begun to take over Ellen’s responsibilities, working with us on issue 5.

From the beginning, there was no question that the Journal of Festive Studies would be an online, open access publication that allowed authors to maintain the rights to their work through a Creative Commons license. We value that this approach would give everyone free access to research that isn’t hidden behind a paywall.

Together, the journal editors, the editorial board, and our contributors both find and bring joy by virtue of the field they study and knowing that others can freely access this scholarship. We are proud of the role we play in expanding the fields of both open access scholarship and festive studies. We hope others will join us in that work.

Cora Gaebel is the managing editor for the Journal of Festive Studies, a cultural anthropologist, a world traveler, and a life cycle celebrant.

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Why Open Access? An Infographic from Julian Chambliss

This week, October 24-30, is International Open Access Week and we’re celebrating by partnering with some of our friends to reflect on the theme of joy in open access!

In this infographic by Julian Chambliss—Professor of English at Michigan State University, Val Berryman Curator of History at the MSU Museum, and faculty lead for the Graphic Possibilities Research Group—shares his perspective on why open access matters.

An infographic titled "Why Open Access?" with information on the mission of the Graphic Possibilities project, connections with teaching, digital humanities, and community building.
This infographic describes the impact of open access on Graphic Possibilities Research Group at Michigan State University. [Long description] [PDF version]
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NSF Grant for New STEM-focused Commons

The Commons team is delighted to have been awarded one of the inaugural FAIROS RCN grants from the NSF, in order to establish DBER+ Commons. That’s a big pile of acronyms, so here’s a breakdown: the NSF is of course the National Science Foundation, one of the most important federal funding bodies in the United States, and a new funder for us. The FAIROS RCN grant program was launched this year by the NSF in order to invest in Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable Open Science (FAIROS) by supporting the formation and development of Research Coordination Networks (RCN) dedicated to those principles.

We have teamed up with a group of amazing folks at Michigan State University who are working across science, technology, engineering, math, and more traditional NSF fields, all of whom are focused on discipline-based education research (DBER) as well as other engaged education research methodologies (the +). Our goal for this project is to bring them together with their national and international collaborators in STEM education to create DBER+ Commons, which will use — and crucially, expand — the affordances of the HCommons network and promote FAIR and CARE (Collective Benefit, Authority to control, Responsibility, Ethics) practices, principles, and guidelines in undergraduate, postbaccalaureate, graduate, and postdoctoral science education research activities.

We are thrilled about the collaboration this grant will allow us to develop, as well as the network advancements it will allow us to build. We’ll share more as the work progresses!

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On Prior Publication

Last week, we received two takedown notices for items deposited to CORE. They arrived at nearly the same time, and so we found ourselves thinking about them in connected ways, though their cases are very, very different.

The first came through AWS Abuse, who passed on a report to us that we were distributing copyright infringing content. Under DMCA Safe Harbor provisions, we are required to take down such potentially infringing material immediately, and can only afterward follow up with an investigation to determine whether it’s actually infringing or whether it should be restored. Agreeing to follow this process is important to the network’s survival, as it’s only through such adherence that we can prevent the Commons from being sued for instances of copyright infringement of which we’re unaware.

In this case, we took the item down. Looking at the document revealed that it was a scan of copyrighted material, so the complainant may have a case. We have, however, inquired with the depositor in case there are complicating circumstances that we should know about.

The second request came to us from a user, who asked us to remove one of their deposits. Generally speaking, we resist removing deposits unless there are very good reasons, given our concern for the continuity of the scholarly record. In this case, it turned out that the deposit was a conference paper that the depositor later submitted for publication by a journal. The journal was now demanding that the deposit be removed, as they have a policy against accepting material that has been published elsewhere.

We reached out to the journal to ask about this policy, noting that even the venerable PMLA would not consider a conference paper deposited in a repository to be a violation of its prior-publication rule.

The response we received was — well, let’s say it — rude. The managing editor ultimately made it clear that if we did not remove the deposit, the journal would rescind its offer of publication to the author.

We are not in the business of harming the careers of our users, and so we have removed the deposit, if reluctantly. But we want to use this incident to open a conversation about the differences between conference papers and published articles, as well as between preprints and publications. We believe that authors have the right to share and seek feedback on the early stages of work prior to submitting that work to publishers, and that the existence of such pre-prints online does not constitute prior publication. And we urge our users to seek venues for publication that do not limit their rights over the ways they share their own work.

What issues have you run into in the relationship between sharing work online and publishing it in more formal venues? How would you encourage us to respond to situations like this? And how might we work together to create a more open, less extractive, and completely non-punitive scholarly communication ecosystem?

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CORE is transitioning to FAST metadata subject headings

Humanities CORE launched as a full-featured beta in May 2015 on MLA Commons. In 2016 it was released to the wider community with the launch of Humanities Commons. A white paper detailing the original project can be found in CORE if you’d like to know more about the history. In the six years since its launch we’ve made improvements to the interface and moved the server to a new home at Michigan State University. We’re now making a major improvement to the metadata associated with CORE deposits.

Subject categorization is a big part of findability. The original list of CORE subjects were derived from the MLA Bibliography subject headings, and focused entirely on the humanities. As the platform has grown and more scholars are doing interdisciplinary work collaborating with STEM and social science partners, we’re implementing FAST metadata subject headings:

FAST (Faceted Application of Subject Terminology) is derived from the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH), one of the library domain’s most widely used subject terminology schemas. The development of FAST has been a collaboration of OCLC Research and the Library of Congress.

FAST is the standard for many repositories, including those hosted by libraries and museums. It provides eight facets: chronological, corporate names, events, form/genre, geographic names, personal names, titles, and topics. These facets have millions of possible combinations but function a bit differently than our legacy subjects. Here’s a few examples:

  • “Medieval Spanish History” becomes “Spain” [geographic], “History” [topical], and “Middle Ages” [topical]
  • “18th-century English literature” becomes “English Literature” [topical] and “Eighteenth Century [topical]
  • “Compositional improvisation” becomes “Improvisation (Music)” [topical] and “Composition (Music)” [topical]
  • “Shakespeare” becomes “Shakespeare, William, 1564-1616” [personal]

[Note: While you will see the facet (topical, personal, etc.) when choosing subjects, once deposited only the subject itself will be displayed.] You can try searching for subjects and keywords using the SearchFAST website. More information about FAST can be found on the OCLC website.

What does this mean to the community?

When you deposit to CORE you’ll search for subject headings using the FAST facets. We’ve included all eight facets except chronological. This might seem tricky at first, but there are millions of combinations across all disciplines to choose from. Just start typing, and the page will begin to show you the subject headings available. Pick the ones that best fit what your deposit is about, and if there are more specific terms you’d like that are not part of FAST, put those in the tags field. You can pick up to ten subjects and ten tags for each deposit.

If you’ve already made a deposit, your subjects will be converted. We’ve gone through three rounds of review and cataloging with our Michigan State University Library metadata librarians, and had a final team review. As shown in the examples above, the specific terms may be slightly different from the original deposit, but should combine to convey the same concept. Some subject headings do not have good equivalents in FAST, and there are some terms that are so new they are not yet present. All of these subjects will move to tags. Examples:

  • “Art History” becomes “Art” [topical] and “History” [topical]
  • “Digital pedagogy” becomes “Education–Computer-assisted instruction” [topical], but the original subject heading will move to a tag for searchability
  • “Narratology” does not map to FAST and will be moved to a tag

Post-conversion, if you do see a subject that you don’t feel quite fits your deposit, let us know. Users who have subjects moved to tags will receive an email listing those deposits.

The benefits of FAST

FAST subject headings are a standardized vocabulary based on the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH). It is one of the most widely used subject vocabularies in the world and has been translated into multiple languages. When you deposit to CORE your deposits are not just preserved but the metadata is indexed by Google, Google Scholar, SHARE, Altmetric, and BASE-OA, which fuels open-access initiatives such as the OA Button and OA DOI. Using recognized subjects that are both human and machine-readable improves findability and allows for easier translation.

FAST subject headings are an ever-growing list, and as new headings are added, our search will include them. As the Commons continues to grow, using FAST allows us to accept deposits across disciplines and facilitates interdisciplinary collaboration. Our goal is for CORE to provide a home for all scholars as they develop new projects, new fields, and new forms of knowledge.

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New and Updated Support and Sustaining Sites

We’ve made major updates to two of our own sites: Commons Support and Sustaining the Commons. Not only is there new content, but both sites were redesigned using the block-based theme Blockbase, and the full site editing tools in WordPress 5.9. While full site editing (FSE) is in beta it’s a powerful way to customize the look and feel of your website without needing use custom code. (Find more on FSE capabilities on our post WordPress 5.9 and Full Site Editing.)

Commons Support

We’ve updated and consolidated the Commons support pages. We’ve flattened the structure of the menus and added a contact form so that you can easily contact support. Guides and FAQs walk you through the most common tasks, the search allows you to easily find what you need, and we’ve minimized the number of clicks necessary to get there.

Full Site Editing

We’ve used the full site editing tools to create two different header looks, one a larger banner style on the home page, and another scaled down version for interior pages.

We’ve made use of reusable blocks to add back buttons to guide pages, and to reuse the Getting Started, Groups, and Sites link sets on the Guides page. On the individual FAQ pages, we’ve incorporated the back button into the page template, allowing us to easily add new content to the FAQ without having to add navigation by hand.

If you’re thinking of building a new site, the full site editing capabilities give you a lot more flexibility in creating a fully customized site. This new functionality allows users to have much more control over their website’s look and feel.

Sustaining the Commons

We originally built this site in order to inform the Commons community about our then-upcoming migration from the MLA to MSU, as well as to share a bit about the sustainability plan we were implementing.

The new Sustaining site is meant to be a home for anything you might want to know about Commons operations. You can find out more there about our governance model, our financial reports, our development and (soon!) community engagement plans, and more. Sustaining is a key means through which the Commons team is showing our work and maintaining our commitments to openness, transparency, equity, and values-enacted governance.

We’ve deployed new contact forms both in Sustaining and in Support; please use them to let us know if you have thoughts or questions. We’ll look forward to hearing from you.